Casting Stones
by Cordelia McGonagall
Summary: A Gryffindor and a Slytherin share a brief moment in time together. Mostly I just want to give Eloise more than acne.


**A/N: Chaser 2 Puddlemere**

 **Optional prompts included the word _reach_ (I used _reached_ ), not using the word _forbidden_ , and the dialogue _"What do you want from me?"_**

 **Thanks to the Lounge who wanted to see an Eloise Midgen story. Hope this suits. The last time I skipped stones, I knew I wanted to write something like this, but I was surprised that this is where Eloise and her Slythein showed up. (I made Ron the boy I thought he might be for Eloise. Forgive me Ron; I do love you.) As always, full credit goes to JKR who made all of these stories for us to play with.**

Sense how

Even the smooth stones ache

With stories of their own

In the shuddering light of day.

from "Life Collects Such Things" by Scott Hastie

 **Casting Stones**

Eloise Midgen was a Gryffindor. I say this not to convince you, though I know you may be racking your brain for a roster - _Hermione Granger, Lavender Brown, Parvati Patil..._ Most at Hogwarts left a mark somehow; perhaps they were remembered by an engraved silver cup or a faded photograph worthy of saving in a cardboard box, tucked for a lifetime away from the scowls of jealous girlfriends. Eloise, however, was erased from the memories of her housemates as the ripples on a pond settle into stillness.

But it matters not at all if we remember her Sorting or her years that followed, for Eloise always knew she was a Gryffindor, even before the Sorting Hat sang it to her. She knew. She didn't know because the Midgen name was woven into Gryffindor lore, though it was, along with Potter and Weasley and Prewett. No. Eloise knew because Gryffindor meant _chivalry_ , it meant _courage_ , and Eloise Midgen had those in spades.

Her mother had been beautiful; she still was for all Eloise knew. It was the kind of beauty that would be mythologized with her absence. And as Eloise aged, her father took comfort in her plainness, in her waist that didn't narrow, in her face that didn't echo the fair skin and high cheekbones of another woman that could leave.

People felt safe with Eloise, and she let them. She clad herself in school robes and gentleness every morning. Her unflinching good cheer was the only weapon she carried. Sometimes her armor was not enough. There were battle scars. It did hurt when Ron Weasley said he'd rather show up to the Yule Ball alone than with her, and it stung when Professor Sprout said she was a silly girl for trying to curse off her spots. Sprout had been right; it had been a moment of weakness unbecoming of a Midgen when Eloise sank between the leaky sinks and let the room spin, the loathing pressing on her belly, her lungs ready to stop trying.

Madam Pomfrey really was kind.

It was early morning, before the Gryffindors were awake, when Eloise was released from the Hospital Wing. She walked down to the lake to steel herself for another day of chivalrously allowing her classmates to feel better about themselves by her measure. She needed her strength to ignore the casual cruelty of people she otherwise admired. It took a lion's heart to offer a spare quill to Ron Weasley, the boy she had once fancied.

The early September sun was fighting its way through heavy blankets of cloud, and Eloise appreciated the cool shade on her pink, newly smoothed face. She stopped every few steps to select choice stones to drop into the pockets of her robes. Before she reached the water's edge, she realized she wasn't alone.

Gregory Goyle was standing on a large, level rock, staring at the lake before him, his hands clasped behind his broad back. He did not turn to her, but Eloise could see his hand, gripped in his other, making a fist.

Without turning, he growled, "What do you want from me? I told you, Draco, I can't anymore. My father says you are going to get me expelled. He says I can do more here than out. I'm not clever like you. I'm not Snape's favourite."

Gregory realized his speech was overlong, and Draco would have ended it well before now. He spun quickly, his wand clenched in his hand. Eloise could see his mind racing over his last words. He scowled at the Gryffindor. Eloise eyed him cooly, nodded a casual acknowledgement, and cast her first stone. She smiled to herself as she counted ten skips on the still waters. She fished another stone from her pocket and sent it to follow the first at the bottom of the lake. Eight skips.

It was easy to ignore the Slytherin. She was skilled at ignoring, so adept that she jumped when Gregory spoke again, this time to her.

"You are good at that," Gregory said. His hoarse whisper did not match his size.

Eloise gave this no thought. "Thank you," she said automatically. If she could absorb a complement, so too would she feel the barbs.

She sent another stone dancing across the silver sheet of lake. Eleven skips.

Six.

Thirteen.

"Show me," Gregory said. It was not a request or a demand. He spoke it as a wish.

"Show you what?" Eloise asked, absently. Twelve skips.

"How. How you..." Gregory picked up a heavy stone and chucked it at the water. Eloise said a small prayer for any merpeople below the surface. She raked her gaze over the ground. Pulling her wand from her robes, she flicked a selection of stones into a tidy cairn between them.

Gregory's impressed look made Eloise squirm as she wondered, _Why did I just show off?_ She cleared her throat. "Pick the flattest stones you can find. Thin. Let me see your hands."

Gregory cocked an eyebrow. Pocketing his wand, he stepped toward her and held out his palms. Eloise held his wand hand and rubbed her thumb over his fingertips. He bent his head over hers and looked down as if he had not seen his own hand before. Eloise hoped she seemed businesslike; she prayed that it wasn't obvious to him that the last time she'd held a boy's hand was two years earlier in a classroom learning dances she would never use.

Her voice was quiet. "Your hands are rough enough to hold a smoother stone. Keep it at a low angle to the water, close but not parallel. You are tall, so you can and should throw it harder than I do. Like you are cracking a whip." She nodded to the pile of stones and waited for him to pick one up before she threw her next stone. Nine skips.

He watched her, and then he threw his stone. Four skips. He turned to his teacher and flashed a grin. Eloise only smiled back when she saw his dimples.

That day, his farthest stone skipped seven times. That was not his best throw, nor was it his worst. They never arranged to meet, but they did, every morning after this one. She came to the lake to center herself for hours of classes which now seemed somehow less lonely, and he came to get away from Draco, if only for a little while. Eloise felt furtive about these mornings, though from whom she was hiding them, she could not say. Hermione would never come near any of Draco Malfoy's associates, but Hermione pined for Ron Weasley, a boy to whom Eloise Midgen was a joke if she was anything at all. Eloise chose not to let her housemates know... _know what, exactly?_ For these mornings were nothing, just two people standing in front of a lake at the same time.

Until it was a little more than nothing. A week after Gregory cast his first stone, he sent a piece of slate skating halfway across the glass of the quiet lake, and he broke the silence with a whoop of joy, grabbing Eloise and lifting her into a hug. Before he could blush, and mutter, and drop her, she kissed him because Eloise was a Gryffindor. Gregory, of course, kissed her back because he was a Slytherin.

The next day lips kissed lips more than stones kissed water. Stones or lips, there was still little talking, for there was nothing that could be said that would allow for more kissing. They didn't talk about Draco. They did not talk about Eloise's father, whose owl posts were increasingly suggesting she'd be better off at home, away from the menacing children of Death Eaters. A week after Eloise and Gregory first kissed, Eloise came into the Gryffindor common room with a bouquet of mountain everlasting, and when Hermione asked where they had come from, Eloise told her they were from a boy, averting her eyes as she did so, so she wouldn't see Hermione's look of shock rearrange into an encouraging smile. Hermione did not ask the boy's name, and for this, Eloise was grateful. Hermione wouldn't have believed that Gregory Goyle was a quick learner at skipping stones and kissing a girl, and Eloise didn't want to convince her it was true.

.o0O0o.

As early as he could manage to slide away unseen, Gregory stumbled down the path in a half-run, his empty stomach twisting with secret dread. For once, he had been grateful for Draco's project; he wouldn't have slept at all last night anyway.

There were whispers in Divination, and then her seat had been empty at dinner. Draco had to be reminded who she was before he shared the gossip that Eloise Midgen's fool father had withdrawn her from Hogwarts. This morning, Gregory's feet crunching over the gravel path was the only noise by the lake. She should have been here by now, her soft brown hair glowing a warm gold in the early dawn. He should have heard her feet scrape along the pebbles as she turned to pivot and throw her first stone. And then he would have kissed her, and she would have smiled a smile that she meant.

Their rock was empty, save for a cairn of stones balanced upon it, patiently waiting for him. He was startled to realize that he didn't know how she'd felt when she set the tower there for him, but he knew without thinking that he would never have the chance to ask her.

There was nothing for it. He took the top stone and turned it over to find the spot where it would settle under his thumb, and he blinked a few times when it did so more easily than any stone he'd ever chosen for himself.

He turned, cocked his wrist, and pushed the stone away from him, watching it punch against the lake - _one, two, three..._ \- and then just six when the lake pulled the stone in. It was as if it had never been in his hand at all.


End file.
